Conventionally, for example, the technique disclosed in JP 2002-164034A has been known as a connection module including multiple housing units that separately house and insulate bus bars. JP 2002-164034A discloses a configuration in which divided plate bodies (housing units) can move independently with respect to the electrodes of a power storage element due to supporting wall portions (bendable portions) of the divided plate bodies being bent. With this configuration, when a battery connection plate (connection module) is attached to the power storage element group, misalignment caused by an allowance in the pitch between the electrodes of the two power storage elements or the like is absorbed so as to improve workability in the attachment task.
JP 2002-164034A is an example of background art.
However, in Patent Document 1 above, since a configuration is used in which the supporting wall portions of the divided plate bodies are integrated by common coupling walls, it could not be said that the positional movement of the individual divided plates can be performed completely independently for each divided plate. In other words, the movement ranges of the individual divided plates are restricted by the common coupling walls.
For this reason, although a method of independently providing bendable portions for the divided plate bodies is conceivable, at that time, if the bendable portions are constituted by synthetic resin, the rigidity of the bendable portions causes the divided plate bodies coupled by the bendable portions to curve due to the weight, and a phenomenon occurs in which one end of the connection module sags. This sagging phenomenon becomes more prominent as the number of divided plate bodies that are coupled increases. If this kind of sagging phenomenon occurs in a connection module, it will no longer be easy to handle the connection module during the task of attachment to the power storage element group, and the efficiency of the attachment task will be reduced.
The technique disclosed in the present embodiment has been completed based on the foregoing circumstance and provides a connection module according to which positional movement of each housing unit can be performed independently and sagging can be suppressed.